Awesomeness by Mistake

Tonight I decided to make chicken tortilla soup. I made it sometime last year and it turned out awesome. This is what it looked like...

The reason I was excited to make it right now is because I got one of these for Christmas...

This cast iron pot is amazing.
So anyhoo, I was making my baked tortilla strips to put on top of the soup and when I started cutting them, I had created the coolest tortilla strips ever! Behold!...

I would tell you how I did it, but that would make no sense. Maybe sometime. Don't you love it when something awesome happens by accident!

I Love Lucy

I have been waiting for this year's Lucille Ball calendar and yes indeed I received it for Christmas. (yay!) The calendar is amazing. Each month is a different bright color with pretty flowery frills and swirly designs and a gorgeous portrait of Lucille Ball. I highly recommend you go to the calendar store and peruse it.

She is stunning.

Here is a preview...

Each year, the Lucy calendar is themed around "I Love Lucy", which is fine, but this year's was so wonderfully different.

Many people (well, some of you do) don't know about my long-time love for Lucille Ball. I have loved her since before I can remember and I have collected I Love Lucy and Lucille Ball memorabilia for a long time. I even drew a portrait of her when I was in high school (with all the intricate shading, rubbing, and what-not) that turned out amazing. It is one of my most prized possessions.

(Yep, I did that!)

Lucille Ball loved making people laugh and she didn't have to try very hard to do it.

She was awesome and I love her. I think everyone has their person from "a little before their time" that they simply love.

Who do you love?

Sedona, Refrigerators and Christmas! Oh my!

Diana and I took our overnight trip to Sedona on Sunday just to get away and spend much needed time together. We had tons of fun. We ate amazing chicken salad sandwiches at the Brewery in Tlaquepaque (*most fun word to say!), saw a living Nativity and walked around looking at all the touristy stuff. I can't believe this gal and I have been best friends for so many years. Best 17 years of my life!

Tonight, my other BFF (Becky) and I are doing the Christmas lights date. It's gonna be awesome. Cant wait!

Onto stuff that is not so awesome (Grrr face >: ) Yesterday after I drove home from Sedona I spent some time with my mom and then went home to meet Josh there just as he was getting home from work. As I walk into the kitchen I am greeted by a puddle on the floor in front of the fridge. I say to myself "What the heck!?" and yell "Josh, we've got a problem!"

So I open the freezer door and things are all soft and not frozen. Great. We have only had the fridge for the five years we have had our house. It's still practically brand new. We moved into our house the week of Christmas in 2004, SO since it has been five years I immediatly said, "the warranty isn't good anymore. I'm sure we didn't get the 5 year warranty!"

I go to look in the file cabinet and there, right in the area labeled "Appliances" is a folder with "refrigerator" written on it. (Uncle Gene is awesome at making sure I have things when I need them, because it was written in his handwriting!)

Anyway...I open the folder and the first page I see is the warranty information... dun dun dunnnn! I look at the coverage start date :Dec.23, 2004. The end date: Dec. 23, 2009!

I screamed as Josh was talking to his dad on the phone and I'm pretty sure my father in law can't hear out of that ear anymore.

Anyway, after calling and dealing with a woman who was very hard to understand and only added to my frustration, I got an appointment for someone to come look at it, but the first available wasn't until Wednesday. We had to take EVERYTHING out of the fridge/freezer and throw most of what was in the freezer away.

The upside... Josh's parents always had a really old fridge in their garage that they would just use for drinks and extra storage. A few years ago when they bought a new kitchen fridge, their old one went into the garage and we go the really old one for our garage. It keeps things so cold and I was glad to have that to at least put in all the stuff that I could save.

We'll see what happens when the repair person comes to look at my poor ice box.

Oh, ya...the saddest part of all...we got everything all cleaned up and wiped out and then we sit down and say "let's have a nice cold drink"...then we realize...we now have no ice.

I kid you not, I took two glasses over to our neighbor's house and asked for ice. They filled our glasses and gave us a whole ziploc full (which we can still keep in the garage fridge's freezer :)

Christmas is in 3 days!!! Aggghhhh!!!!!! So excited!!!!!!!!!!!!

Two Posts in One!? Awesome!

The Holidays are here!

Well, first, let me say that science camp did happen and of course it went GREAT! I am so lucky to have a class I love so much. I actually have fun with my students (even when I have to "yell" at them for stuff. (I never really yell, it just seems that way to me. I can think I do it and then my kiddos say stuff like "what? you never yell at us!") That makes me smile :)

Another great part of school life is being able to work with my best friends. Ya, we're lucky. My teammates are the most awesome people I could have ever gotten to work with.

(*I am posting this picture despite how awful I believe I look in it.)

(Cameras really do add ten pounds. )

Now that camp is over and I can actually breathe and think if other things... it's time for Christmas!! Woo hoo!

Oh, and if you recall the whole lost reservation fiasco of camp '09
(I know you're saying, "Lauren, how could we forget!")

... this year I got printed confirmation of next year's reservation AND I saw the woman enter it into the computer with my own eyes. I'm not going through that again, sheesh!

Ok, back to Christmas... Josh and I got the tree put up this week and I know I say this every year, but, I really love our tree. It is so beautiful. I just want to stare at it for hours.
(Which I know I achieve by the time Christmas is over. )

The weather has gotten colder and it really is beginning to look (and feel) a lot like Christmas!

I still have to finish shopping for everyone, make some sort of delicious treat for neighbors and friends and wrap all the wonderful gifts I get to give to people I love.

One more week of school and then two weeks off!

What do I get to look forward to for the break?

1. My annual "date" with Becky where she takes me out to look at Christmas lights. I love that we do this. People say we are lovers*, I say they are jealous!
*P.S. We are just awesomely best friends and people really are probably jealous. Dont worry Kole, you're marriage is safe :)

2. My other BFF Diana and I are going to spend a night in Sedona! For no other reason than just to spend time together because I pretty much never see her and it sucks. It's going to be so fun and I get to buy this game they apparently only sell in Sedona called Yamslam.
Look it up. If you love Yahtzee, you will be like "I love Yamslam!"

3. Family time: a.) The big Christmas Eve shin-dig at my parent's house-it's pretty much one of the highlights of my year.
b.) The time Josh and I spend alone opening our presents to each other (which we have decided we may do on Christmas Eve morning because we are at my parent's house all night and then we wake up and go to his parent's house Christmas morning, and because we love making our own rules!)

c.) Celebrating the fact that Josh proposed to me six years ago on Christmas Adam (Dec. 23- get it? because Adam came before Eve, hee hee, love it!). Maybe i'll post about it after it happens.

C'mon Christmas break!!!!
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Surprise! Since I haven't posted in a long while, I will do another post within this post.

The Eight Crazy Nights!!!

Remember how awesome I was just saying my friends are? Well, we decided a few months ago that we were going to conduct our own series of Eight Crazy Nights. These nights consist of eight different Saturdays at different people's houses, each with a different drink (optional for the non-drinkers), and a different game.

We are half way done and so far we have had so much fun!
Here are the details of the first four Crazy Nights:

#1 - Vodka bar and Singstar (we had to miss this one, but it looked awesome)
#2 - Malibu Barbies (Malibu rum and pineapple juice) and Bunco
#3 - Dirty drinks (like Sex on the Beach) and the game Dirty Minds: For example..."I am pink and when you put me in your mouth I get soft." I don't know what you're thinking, but it's bubble gum! :)
#4 - Appletinis and Apples to Apples

These nights have been so fun and I cannot wait for the rest!
This may have to be a year-round thing. Good friends, good times! You should come!